#queer stuff

[ilovedthestars]

"how do you feel about labels as a queer person?"

[thankyouforthefunny]

[nedlittle]

for $1 name your favourite fictional lesbian. and no "straight female character popularly fanonized as a lesbian" or "this male character is a lesbian to me" allowed

[pharawee]

Marriage Equality Achieved!

Today, January 23, the marriage equality law officially takes effect. Thailand now recognizes the right of all couples, regardless of gender, to legally register their marriage.

At 6.15am, the first couple, 33 year old Ploynapas Jirasukon and 32 year old Kwanporn Kongphet arrived, hand in hand, to register their marriage. Together for 17 years since high school, the Bangkok-based couple radiated joy as they became Thailand’s first officially recognised LGBTQ+ married couple.

Ploynapas shared her excitement, “We’re thrilled to be the first couple to register our marriage. It’s a proud moment, but there’s still more to achieve, like equality in child custody and legal titles.”

Sumalee, 64, and Thanaporn, 59, became the first same-sex couple to register their marriage at Bang Rak today.

Traveling all the way from Phetchabun, they chose Bangkok's "district of love" for this special occasion.

Permsap and Puangphet, the second couple to register their marriage in Pathumwan District, shared that they had waited 17 years for this moment, calling it a meaningful achievement.

Although they could have registered in Pai, they chose Pathumwan to express pride in exercising the same legal rights as other Thais. They wore traditional Tai Yai attire from Mae Hong Son, reflecting one partner's heritage, to make the occasion special.

They described the milestone as a collective success for the LGBTQ+ community, achieved through shared efforts.

They hoped future legal changes would address honorific titles for transgender individuals, ensuring fairness for all. The couple encouraged others to stay determined in the fight for equality, believing that persistence leads to success. They also urged countries without equal marriage laws to continue advocating for change.

Reflecting on a past accident, they shared the difficulties caused by the lack of legal recognition. Despite being together for eight years at the time, one was unable to sign medical consent due to the law, underscoring the need for equal marriage rights.

Source: Thai Enquirer, Thairath & The Thaiger

[variousqueerthings]

do think when people say "we know marriage is a social construct, but it's a legal way to be able to take care of someone else and vice versa" as if those of us making a point about marriage (i would say, a lot of us being aromantic people especially) don't know this fact, are missing a bit of the point about why this is stressed and potentially not giving enough grace to (again especially aromantic) people who say this.

when it's framed as a "so just get married for legality reasons" and im like. you mean like how gay people married/marry people of the opposite gender for legality reasons? and that's considered to be a symptom of a problem, not the solution? you want people to "just" get married against their will because it's the only solution this system has available?

if people cannot or will not get married for whatever reason -- not just for being aromantic, but, say, due to inefficient disability support measures within marriage, because of having had bad experiences with marriage in the past, because of being polyamorous, because some element of marriage is ineffective, unwanted, limited, discriminatory, or hell, because you can't find somebody to marry or nobody wants to marry you, or maybe because you just plain don't want to without there being a distinct Reason -- then it's a problem that this is the only framework in place for people to be afforded certain legal and social protections.

i am glad for others that more people can get married, but it's a flawed institution with gaping holes that isn't for everyone and builds social structures that leave so many people behind and unsupported. this is abundantly obvious in the way that we saw why people pushed for the need for equal marriage in the first place.

that's what's said when making a point that it's a social construct. and also what's meant (partially) when pushing against the idea that "love" as concept isn't at the core of queer (amongst others hinted at in this post) activism, because it's about building better structures. if the only people we care about are those we "love" within a family unit, or those who successfully manage to pretend that unit without actually really wanting it, and if not being in that unit for whatever reason means that care isn't going to be/is no longer afforded, then are we really doing any better than heteronormativity?

more people need to read up on "amatonormativity" from the original source (this is a summary from the same person written in 2012 and so doesn't include aromantic, but it's all in there) before they start pushing marriage as the ultimate goal of queer liberation, or indeed any liberation.

[infiniteorangethethird]

anyone else feeling rather... annoyed at the way ppl have come to define and use queerplatonic and qprs? So many times I see ppl talk abt qprs saying they're "friendship but Deeper" or "a relationship strictly between friendship and romance" or "essentially romance lite/romance for aromantics" and like. A qpr definitely can be all that if the participants want that, but to say that this is THE definition of queerplatonic is actually going directly against the very goal for which the term was created. Queerplatonic was supposed to give us a word to be able to talk about relationships that don't fit neatly into the "romantic" and "platonic" boxes, whilst also deconstructing the relationship hierarchy and the idea that friendships are fundamentally lesser than romantic relationships. So can we please stop using qprs as a way to once again make friendships seem like a lesser form of relationship and to reinforce the relationship hierarchy? Please?

Afaik the original definition of a qpr was smth along the lines of "a relationship that doesn't fit the traditional boundaries of a friendship". By that definition? A loveless friendship would be a qpr. A "friendship" between two aplatonics would be a qpr. A friendship where they specifically feel less emotionally connected to one another than is expected of a "normal" friendship would be a qpr. Just like how queerness isn't fundamentally about love, queerplatonicism, i.e. queering the platonic, isn't fundamentally about "putting more love" into friendships. It can be, but it doesn't have to be.

[king-the-pathetic]

Happy pride month folks

I promise it gets better

Fridge Art credits